I've noticed that punts are only acquirable by quests or by buying them for adequate barter material in a village. This wouldn't be bad in terms of game balance, but from a realism perspective, it has me scratching my head a bit...
Unless I'm mistakened (and feel free to correct me), the punts in URW are basically
dugout boats (monoxylons). They're a single tree trunk carved into the shape of a small, usable boat, and often propelled by a
sesta (punt pole), or a paddle. At least that's the impression I've had from some of the photographic illustrations provided for these simple vehicles.
If they're made from a single tree trunk and are dugouts, wouldn't it make some degree of sense that the player could manufacture one ? At least a smaller, one-man version, perhaps ?
Not without limitations, of course. I think a natural potential limitation could be the type of axes (e.g. a carving axe) and other tools (e.g. knives) at the player's disposal. Unless the player acquires a small array of very specific tools, he/she can't hollow out the tree trunk on a whim, as if it was no hard work and no effort at all.
I just find it strange that you have to go to a lot of trouble finding material for a raft - three separate tree trunks, then tying equipment you have to manufacture over a long time - when it's a simple vehicle only at first glance, but requires a lot more material investment. The punt looks far simpler in comparison. Granted, I think that if craftable punts were to be included, another limitation for them would be the length of time needed for manufacturing.
For rafts, you'd need to gather a lot of materials, but the assembly time would be short, while for punts, you'd only need a tree trunk as material, but it might take
a good long while until you hollow it out into a suitable punt shape. At least as long as it takes to build three or four segments of a log cabin ("Wooden Building") wall in the game, with an average character. This would help prevent the crafting of punts to become easily abusable, and instead make it into something more of a long-term goal.
Additionally, maybe another way to make punt crafting a bit harder is the need to gather information on the process first from particular villages. You go to a village, meet the local who sells fishing and watercraft related goods, and you have to be on good terms with him/her and sell them something before they decide to tell you how to properly build a punt. Only then, and with the right tools for the job, could you start hollowing out a tree trunk. In essence, you could still craft a punt, but it would require some effort to become skillful at this sort of task, and this would in turn guarantee that people wouldn't avoid crafting rafts. Rafts would still be useful and necessary until the player learns how to build his or her own punt.
Just some thoughts on the subject. I'd love to hear others' opinions on this, the pros and cons.
I know there are already some good mods out there or in development that add more craftable watercraft, especially of the simple variety, but I was wondering whether punts could be given a similar treatment. One that wouldn't make the game much easier, but would still give the player
slightly more options when trying to fish or travel across water.
Topic: Craftable punts ? And what should the limitations be ? (Read 19651 times)